Michele Bachmann took a question from the crowd in Storm Lake, Iowa (Jason Noble/The Register).

Storm Lake, Ia. – The United States’ foreign policy should be based on instilling fear in other countries, presidential candidate Michele Bachmann told a crowd here this morning.

“That’s the problem today in foreign policy: You want the other nations to fear us,” Bachmann said. “They don’t fear us today. They laugh at us. This is serious. The United States is being mocked at and laughed at. We’re the military super power of the world and we’re being mocked at and laughed at and being disrespected?”

The comments came in the midst of a discussion about defending Israel and challenging Iran’s influence in the Middle East.

“I will use absolutely everything in our arsenal against the Iranians,” Bachmann said. “Because they need to know that they should fear the United States.”

As she spoke, a man in the crowd interrupted, asking whether the U.S. should be feared or respected.

“We want both,” Bachmann replied. “We want to be both feared and respected. No. 1 you want respect. But when you’re respected you’re also feared.”

OTHER THEMES: Bachmann, a Minnesota Congresswoman, also called out her Republican opponents to a greater degree than she has in previous Iowa appearances.

She twice criticized fellow candidate Herman Cain by name – once for his stance on military action in Iran and again for his 9-9-9 tax plan. She also criticized candidate Rick Perry’s optional flat tax.

Bachmann also continued her sharp criticism of incumbent President Barack Obama, suggesting at one point that Operation Fast and Furious – the Department of Justice’s program allowing weapons purchases by Mexican criminal organizations in order to build cases against them – was in fact a scheme to increase border violence to justify further gun control.

“The scuttlebutt is that the reason why they gave them these guns is to create more violence on the border so that President Obama can call for gun control,” she said.

She also called for the repeal of Obama’s signature health-care law and suggested the federal government under Obama had become a “Al Capone government” rewarding political contributors.

SETTING: The Lakeshore Family Restaurant in Storm Lake.

CROWD: About 40, mostly elderly Storm Lakers with coffee cups in hand on a cold weekday morning. The crowd filled the small meeting space, and was enthusiastic throughout.

THE CANDIDATE’S DAY: Bachmann’s town-hall meeting in Storm Lake begins a day of campaigning that will take her to Webster City, West Des Moines and the fourth floor of the Des Moines Register for a meeting with the Editorial Board.

PLACE IN THE RACE: Bachmann is in the midst of a busy week for her campaign and several others in Iowa. She was in western Iowa on Monday, will spend tomorrow in the Des Moines area and then attend a multi-candidate event focused on social issues in Des Moines on Saturday. The trip is part of her intensive effort to court Iowa conservatives ahead of the first-in-the-nation caucuses. Doing well here is seen as make-or-break for her campaign.